Its wide curve encourages driving over the speed limit, perhaps leading to the January 17th death of a teenager and the severe injuries of his fellow passengers. There is armco on the outside of curve, a barrier between Ian Mc Kinnon and the low trees beside the Western Motorway . The driver of the black Holden decapitated two trees on the unfenced inside of the curve before making a crescent around a third.

Twenty five years ago I walked down Ian Mc Kinnon reflecting on both the movie I had just seen and the experience I had the previous weekend. I don’t remember the name of the movie; quite probably subtitled or a science fiction parody. I remembered the weekend; a facilitated unnerving step into the subconscious. Seductive.

I didn’t discover till twenty years later that the grade seperated intersection that demarcated the boundary between Ian McKinnon Drive and Dominion Road was the only element executed of a plan to construct a motorway along the path of Dominion Road. It would have linked the present central motorway junction to SH20 and the airport. Stuck last year on a bus to Auckland Airport and then Hamilton I considered the cost would have been worth it.

Walking along Ian Mc Kinnon Drive and then Dominion Road I had no knowledge of what would unfold in my life in the years beyond. I did know that I had to walk fast-ish to make the next screening of “The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, Her Lover”.

A week after a weekend of attempting to crack open the sandstone surrounding my heart the opening scenes of TCTFHWHL were hard going. Two hours of cruelty, misery and revenge were not mitigated by a younger Dame Helen shagging in the restaurant toilets. The movie did join my list of color memories.

My first color memories came from Christmas time in the small coastal town of Whangamata. The colored lights strung along the cabanas on the harbour front, the incandescent Christmas tree lights, the blue and brown rubber reindeer under the tree and the ‘stained glass windows” we made at school with cellophane.

Some days when the sandstone around my heart needs a shake I walk along Dominion Road making some new color memories.